


Welcome to Spacekru

by Ghelik



Series: The 100 Fics [68]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Culture Shock, F/M, Grounder Culture, Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-26
Updated: 2019-01-26
Packaged: 2019-10-16 15:25:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,214
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17552231
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ghelik/pseuds/Ghelik
Summary: Or how a band of misfits becomes a family





	Welcome to Spacekru

**Author's Note:**

> Sophie wanted a becho baby fic, but I got her this thing instead ^^' Sorry my dear.

Space smells like the Mountain did. It is a pungent, unnatural smell, mixed with rust and new metal and rosins. The scents waft through the ventilation system, following her everywhere and making her nauseous.

Nobody else seems to be bothered by the stench, but Echo has to regularly swallow back bile, holding her breath for as long as her lungs allow. Sometimes, when there is nobody around to witness, she allows herself to empty the contents of her stomach when nausea overtakes her.

There is much to be done, and little time to be ill, so she controls herself. Raven Reyes needs able-bodied people to help her carry heavy machinery around. The skaikru second is a witty, spirited woman, always with a thousand things to do. She explains the tech in long rambling tirades that leave the spy struggling to understand. The frikdreina, on the other hand, doesn’t seem to have trouble following some of the explanations. She readily asks for clarifications when needed and is rewarded with Raven Reyes’ appraising smile and gentle words.

It is slightly unsettling to be surpassed in rank by a frikdreina, but Echo knows her life lies in the mercy of her former enemies, which makes her a slave to their whims in all but name.

So she bites her tongue and helps Raven Reyes set up her heavy machines.

Monty Green is the group’s High Farmer – not that there are any other farmers in the small band. His mangled hands won’t allow him to do much of anything, so he spends his days ordering Bellamy Blake, Murphy and Echo around the soon to be his hydroponic farm. Bellamy Blake and Murphy are also responsible for aiding him in more personal matters.

Their healer is Harper McIntyre, and Echo cannot bring herself to cross the threshold of their med bay with the gleaming instruments and the pale walls and the syringes.

She stands at the door, holding the box of supplies they’ve ordered her to bring to the blonde woman, her feet rooted to the ground and her heart beating in her throat.

She hears it: the whirl of machinery and the thud of the boy's body as it is laid down on the floor. The crude comments of the two young monsters as they drag it through a metal door and turn to the silent cages. The impotence of knowing there is nothing she can do and the knowledge that she is too afraid to do anything even if she could. The room smells of death, and she knows it will rear its ugly head towards her. Next time their crackling electricity touches her and the world turns dark and unreal, next time their poison paralyzes her, and she's caged inside her own mind while they bleed her like a pig she will not wake. She's trapped, and she's in line for a dishonorable death and they-

“Echo?”

The monster touches her. Crackling electricity at its fingertips, the bars of her cage close in on her and she doesn’t want to die. This is not how she dies.

“Echo?!”

Another monster is on her, pushing her to the ground. No bleeding then, they just want to have their drunken fun with her. She pulls her lips back from her teeth. If they don't put her down with their poison, she might get an honorable warrior’s death after all.

She fights them off, waits for the bite of their lightning weapons, but it doesn’t come. Someone slams her against a wall, stone weirdly smooth and cold like the hands of death. Her arms are wrenched behind her back. Someone’s shouting. Someone’s sobbing.

She feels the sturdy frame of the monster at her back, squashing her. She feels the cloth rubbing on her bare back, the foul breath fanning over the side of her face.

She bucks, but she isn't strong enough to shake him. Adrenaline is still coursing through her veins, muting the gut-wrenching fear. "Get it over with, then."

“Where are you?” asks a weirdly familiar voice at her back.

The question comes so out of left field, it leaves her blinking at the stonewall. Only it’s not stone. It’s metal. A metal wall makes no sense. The mountain didn’t have metal walls, only doors. To her left is a dark window. The mountain didn’t have windows. She turns her head and sees a familiar profile.

No monster. Just a Skaikru man – Bellamy.

The world comes rushing into focus, and she remembers: Praimfaya, Polis engulfed in flames, a small tin can rocketing into the sky.

“You with us?”

She nods against the wall, and Bellamy lets go of her arm, she can feel the throb of her skin where his fingers wrapped around her forearm. He steps back, allowing her to turn and see what she has done. Harper McIntyre is tipping her head back, blood pouring out of her nose. The frikdreina Emori has a red welt on her cheek and here is starting to swell shut. Still, she's holding a furious looking Murphy back.

Bellamy stays close, shielding his people from her.

Echo feels sick. She is on borrowed time already, and she’s lashing out like some rabid animal.

_You know what has to do with rabid animals._

She backs away, her back colliding with the cold metal of the hall's wall.

_Nowhere to go._

They are going to put her down. She is useless if she can’t perform a simple task like deliver supplies without causing a scene.

"Murphy, why don't you help Harper get the bleeding under control?”

“What about her?”

“I’ll deal with Echo.” Murphy doesn’t look happy, but he turns to Harper McIntyre, closely followed by the frikdreina Emori, leaving Echo and Bellamy alone in the hall.

“Come, let’s get out of here.”

The spy follows.

He’s probably kicking himself for wasting resources on her over the last few days. The precious air they spent on her could've significantly helped when they first arrived at the palace in the Void.

He opens a door and steps aside, their execution chamber, no doubt.

When the light snaps on, she sees a bed and a small desk, shelves mounted on the walls.

She turns to him, and Bellamy shrugs. "I noticed you sleeping under the desks in the mess hall. We have enough room for you to have a bed, you know.”

Echo looks around the room. Is this a Skaikru tradition?

“There is no need for last rites. It would only be a drain on your resources.”

Bellamy frowns. “Last rites? What because of what happened?”

“I attacked your healer.”

There is a moment of silence. The Skaikru leader can’t her in the eye, staring instead at the wall behind her left shoulder. “It was the mountain, wasn’t it? You thought you were inside the Mountain.”

It isn’t a question, so she doesn’t interrupt.

Bellamy rubs the back of his head like he’s wont to do and wanders into the room, collapsing into the chair. Echo remains standing by the door. When he talks again, he does so looking at his hands “I know what it’s like. Going somewhere and finding yourself back in-“ he cuts himself short, hiding his weakness as quickly as possible. With a sigh he looks up, eyes flitting over her before fixing in a point over her shoulder. “Nobody here is going to punish you for something you cannot control.”

“Warrior's dream is an infection. It needs to be cut out before it spreads to other warriors."

His eyes snap to her so quickly, she takes a step back. “I won’t kill anyone else. Like it or not you are one of us now, and I am not losing anyone else.”

“With all due respect, master, what good is a mind crippled warrior to you?”

"I told you once, and I'll repeat it. You are strong."

Echo huffs, fighting to reign her temper in. “I am a sick warrior with barely a grasp of what is going on. Let’s face it, there is nothing up here I can do to help you. I can’t even get supplies from one end of the ship to the other!”

“It took four of us to take you down.” He stands. “We need you to train us.”

Echo frowns at the unexpected command. “Train you in combat skills. That is my purpose?”

Bellamy nods. “Yeah.”

He is giving her a reason to be here, something to do and the wave of relief that washes over her makes her knees go weak.

“I won’t let you down, master.”

“Please, just call me Bellamy.”

 

***

 

Echo spends a lot of time in her cell.

The door is never locked, and she never has a guard escorting her. Nobody told her she had to stay in her room, but she knows it is more convenient for Skaikru if they always know where to find her.

The spy does her chores, helping at the hydroponic farm and assisting Raven Reyes as much as she possibly can. Sometimes she joins Emori and Murphy in the storage rooms, but the Fox makes it evident that she isn’t welcome there and the frikdreina creeps her out, so she tries to avoid both of them when possible. After lunch she goes to the small training room she set up and explains techniques and has them repeat movements over and over again. After a few days, she decides to spar with each of them individually.

Monty Green, Harper McIntyre, Raven Reyes, and Bellamy sit to the side while the frikdreina Emori steps forward with a wicked grin. “Oh, this is going to be fun.”

She is quick and flexible, not extremely strong, but her reflexes are akin to those of a snake, and she won't stay down. It takes Echo an embarrassingly long time to take her down. Emori lacks technique and fines but makes up for it with her versatility and the easiness with which she changes tactics.

Bellamy has the strength and some technique, as does Harper McIntyre, but they are slow and predictable. Monty Green lacks everything and Raven Reyes points at her braced leg and shrugs: "Guess I will be skipping class."

“I need to see the whole range of moment you can perform, to strengthen the muscles.”

Raven Reyes isn't happy, but she complies, and it doesn't take long to decide that the mechanic will need a completely different training routine than the others. The woman is always in pain, and the more exercise she does, the worse it seems to be, which frustrates the mechanic to no end.

“If you want, after the lesson, I can try and ease the worst of the pain,” Echo says on the third day.

Raven curls her lip. “I’ll manage.”

Over the few weeks, she has been in this floating castle, Echo has found out a few things about her Skaikru companions. Between those things is the fact that Raven Reyes abhors being inefficient.

“It would improve your performance greatly.”

The Skaikru second isn’t happy about it, but she agrees nonetheless. And so, after the lesson, Echo has her lay down on the floor, pushes her shirt to the side and applies pressure on the knots in Raven Reyes’ lower back. She works silently, concentrating on the muscles under her fingers, instead of the expanse of skin, or the groans of pleasure she is making.

"God, you have great hands," Raven Reyes purrs, and Echo has to fight the urge to preen.

After she finishes, Echo returns to her quarters. There isn’t much to do there, so she sits in her chair and waits until Skaikru has need of her.

Patience is a spy’s greatest asset.

 

***

 

When she visits her, Harper McIntyre looks uneasy and timid with her braided hair and baggy clothes standing at the door like it isn’t her right to go where she pleases. “Hey, you busy?”

The spy stands at attention. “What can I do for you, Harper McIntyre?”

“Where the hell did you get my last name?”

“Murphy uses it under his breath sometimes.”

Harper blinks, makes a ‘huh' sound and shrugs it off. "There's no need for the formalities. Everyone just calls me Harper. As a matter of fact, you can call us all by our first names. Well, not Murphy. I think only Emori is allowed to call him John, but yeah, the rest of us, we are fine with first names.”

Echo frowns. “First names?”

A blush creeps over Harper’s cheeks, making them glow bright scarlet. “You know, your given name?” she pauses. “I guess I never thought about it: don’t you have surnames?”

“We only have one name.”

“Echo kom Azgeda, right?”

“That is accurate.”

“We have surnames, too. That is a name we get from our fathers. Or mothers.”

Echo nods. “I assume the surname comes after your first name.”

“Yeah, exactly.”

“Why?”

“Well, people did it before the bombs- the first praimfaya - I guess we kept doing it after we went to space.”

Harper wanders tentatively into the room, Echo steps aside, offering her chair. “Anyway, I am done for the day, and was wondering if you wanted to play cards with me until dinner.”

Echo wonders why Harper is seeking her company instead of anyone else’s, but this is her superior asking demanding her assistance, and she will not test her freedom. Cards also beats sitting in her chair with nothing better to do, so, it’s a win-win situation.

“Of course.”

Echo sits on the edge of her bed and watches Harper’s nimble hands as she shuffles the deck.

“I am sorry,” Harper says after a while.

“What for?”

“I know it's too late, and it was weeks ago, but I was too ashamed, and I didn't know how to approach you. And I am sorry, I ramble when I am nervous." Harper clears her throat, looks away and starts again. "I am sorry for not noticing you were having a hard time. I could’ve gone get those supplies myself.”

“It was me who attacked you.”

"You didn't attack me. You didn't even know I was there." Echo doesn't answer, and Harper deals the cards. They play in silence for a while.

“I am sorry I punched you.”

“As I said. You didn’t do it on purpose.”

 

After that, Harper comes more often into her room, sometimes with cards, sometimes with her glowing screen. They sit in silence, or they play. Echo isn't sure why the Skaikru healer does this, but she seems to enjoy the spy’s company, and it is a welcome distraction from the endless waiting.

 

***

Most nights in space are long, lonely affairs.

It is difficult to sleep with the ship’s constant hum in her ear, with the knowledge that these strangers she’s sharing the Space Palace with could quickly turn on her. Her belly grumbles with hunger, and she grows weaker and weaker, her body mass dwindling, and the lack of nutrition and constant nausea making her belly bulge.

She went through something like this once, during the Great Draught when she was fourteen and spent half a winter with only a few morsels a week. The fact that the only thing there is to eat is revolting green algae sludge doesn’t help.

The others are better off now that Monty’s farm is working and the sludge isn’t poisonous anymore. They don’t like the algae, but they eat it and don’t feel the need to heave it back up. Raven and Harper have started regaining some of the weight they lost during their first two months, and Emori is quickly following.

The only one who regards their food with distrust is Murphy, who, after spending two weeks in a poison-induced sleep views their diet with a healthy dose of suspicion.

Echo splays her hands over her protruding stomach.

 _It’s malnutrition and hunger,_ she tells herself. _It must be._

Echo turns on her side, fishes the knife from under her pillow, presses her back to the cold metal wall and curls her legs against her chest.

_It’s just hunger, once I get used to the algae, it will go away._

In her dreams she stands at the feet of the Winter Palace’s dais, her blood-covered hands cupped around a chalice full of a steaming, foul-smelling cleansing potion. It tastes bitter, and it sends her to her knees in agony. Cramps washing through her, threatening to tear her in half.

In her dreams there is a body at her feet she doesn't want to look at, and above her, Nia sneers. “Are you a barn animal? Stand up straight, girl!”

 

***

 

After dinner, they establish the tradition of playing a game. Either cards or board games, sometimes they have to guess words or find out make-belief murders. Cards are the overall favorite, Monty teaches Emori and Echo a game called poker. Poker doesn’t consist in poking anyone, it is a gambling game that involves gathering cards and winning prices. Echo learns quickly that playing against Emori is always a sure way of loosing.

 

***

 

When Echo was little, she lived for a short time with her aunt in a small cottage. There her aunt and uncle told her stories of Spirits. Her uncle was always talking about the Fox: a trickster and a jokester, as playful as it was dangerous.

Nia wasn't fond of old tales, her approach to religion was a pragmatic "if I can't use it to my advantage, it is useless." But the soldiers of her army enjoyed their myths and superstition – carefully carved words of protection in the handles of swords, braided hair around their wrists to tug them back home after a battle, coins in their pockets to pay for safe passage through the Void – and Echo spent a lot of time with the Queen’s army.

Patrick liked to leave offerings in the hollow trunk of a tree near a crossroad – bits of string or dry meat, a particularly shiny rock if he was feeling generous a small stub of a candle – to get Fox’s wit on his side. “If Fox walks among us," he used to say jokingly, "better to have him on your side.”

Echo wanders down the corridor.

Over the past months, she's made friends with all of her new kru members but one.

Murphy, the resident trickster, and scavenger are elusive and only shares a room with her if there are other Skaikru present.

Echo slips into the storage room. The man is sitting by himself, sorting scrap into two piles seemingly at random. He’s listening to the screeching shrieks of a male voice from one of the portable music devices Raven rigged for them.

The spy looks down at her offering. It’s not string or meat, but she hopes it’s enough to appease him. If she is going to spend the next five years with six other people, she might as well try and make nice with them.

Mindful to announce her presence with a soft knock to the side of the door, she watches the man roll his head lazily towards her. And tense as soon as he recognizes her. Scrambling to his feet so quickly, he knocks one of his piles to the side.

“Hello,” Echo tries, taking a step forward. Murphy forces himself to remain where he is. “I was wondering if you needed help?”

“No.”

He is dismissing her. But she continues forward.

"We haven't had much chance to talk" it is a lie; there have been plenty of chances. "I heard you posed as a flamekeeper and tricked Ontari.” Murphy doesn’t move a muscle. “I wish I could’ve seen her bested like that. She was always way too arrogant.” Still nothing. “They say you orchestrated her death in revenge for crossing you.”

Echo rolls her tongue over her teeth, sets her offering on the floor in front of her and lights a small match. Out of the corner of her eye, she sees Murphy's eyes tracking the movement of the flame. "They say you feasted on her heart."

“If I could’ve avoided it, I would’ve never touched that black thing,” the venom in his voice is not unexpected. Even among the high ranking Az warriors, Ontari wasn’t beloved. He is staring at the small candle, his hands curled into trembling fists. “But Abby had me pump it to keep the blood flowing for Clarke to take out the City of Light.”

Echo stares at him. This part she didn’t know. “Thank you, for your part in freeing my people.”

“If it were for me all of Azgeda could’ve died in that hell.”

It feels like a slap. “I am sorry, for your loss in the mountain.”

“The mountain?”

She looks up. What else did her people do to Skaikru to warrant so much hatred?

He is rubbing his neck. Not in the boyish manner, Bellamy does when he's feeling unsure, but in a nearly frantic tug of his collar, like it's too tight to breathe.

It is something he does often, Echo noticed.

His hatred isn’t born from losing someone in the mountain, or from war. It is from a wrong done to him.

“I don’t know what happened in Polis. But-“

“Save it. I did what I had to. As far as I am concerned you are all like her.”

“Is that why you can’t even look at me?”

“I can’t look at you because I want to drive my fist into your face. Repeatedly. Until something breaks.”

"You punch me with that fist, the only thing that will break in your hand. You have to put your thumb outside, like a latch keeping the fingers closed." The young man looks down at his hands and closes them like Echo indicates. "I can let you beat me up if that helps?"

Murphy looks at her for a very long moment. Then his attention is drawn back to his offering. “Where did you get that candle?”

“It was in my pack. You can keep it, Monty has told me fire is strictly prohibited in the Ring, but Emori says you miss it.” She stands and backs away. “I’ll leave you to your work.”

 

***

 

Echo looks down at her swollen belly.

It is not hunger.

Her hands tremble when she touches it, tears welling up in her eyes.

 

***

 

“Echo,” she straightens at her new commander’s voice. Bellamy strides into the washing room, where she is folding laundry.

“Yes?”

He looks askance, shifts uncomfortably from one foot to the other. “I was wondering“ he clears his throat. “Are you alright?”

There is concern in his voice, and the way he plays with his fingers and can’t quite hold eye contact suggest he is sincere and mortified by his worry.

“Of course.”

“I-I was only- You can tell us, you know? If there is something- _wrong_.” The way he says that last word snaps her attention like a kick to the kidney. He suspects something. He knows she has been lying and will kick her out of the clan.

Echo fights the sudden panic, the wave of nausea, and the terrifying urge to tell him. That is the problem with Bellamy, something about him is extremely inviting, luring her to trust him no matter what.

“There is nothing wrong.”

Bellamy stares at her for a long moment in which she is sure he will call her on her lie. It wasn't even a compelling one. "Ok."

He leaves her to her laundry.

 

***

 

Girl nights are fun. The female half of the Ring’s population huddles together in one of their rooms with “stolen” algae beer and bows and brushes. They lie around and talk, gossiping about their male counterparts, complaining and remembering their past and drinking. The beer may not taste good, but it is really strong and half a bottle later they are all drunk.

Emori tells the most incredible stories of her wasteland heists. Harper speaks about the Skybox and her parents. Raven tries to convince them that there is nothing better than spacewalking.

“What about sex?” asks Emori, an impish smile on her beautiful face.

"You haven't had sex until you've tried it in Zero-G," says Harper, and that gets them all excited for more details.

Echo has never had this sort of sorority. Friends that share so freely and so much, the carless trust that what is shared between these walls will stay there.

She doesn't share much about her life. The few things she told them about her childhood somehow always manage to make the other girls sad, compassion flashing in their faces. But it is fun just listening to them and rejoicing in the feeling of belonging to their small group, knowing they will fetch her whenever they plan one of their nights, that they care enough to want her to be part of their little group.

“What about you, Echo?”

“My sex life isn’t as lively as yours.”

Emori rolls over in her bed. When drunk, the Wastelander has a tendency of disrobing, which means she is splayed in her nothing but her birthday suit and headscarf. The glove carelessly discarded and her deformed hand lying innocuously on her belly. After such a long time sharing a space with her, Echo has started to forget about it, regarding it as just other feature of her friend, like her beautiful smile or the bold tattoo. “What do you mean? People weren’t throwing themselves at your feet?”

“I had other things in my mind than partners, Emori.”

“Nobody?” Harper looks alarmed.

Echo rolls her eyes, fights the urge to cradle her swollen belly and gives in to their prodding. Patrick is dead, what does it matter if she speaks of him or not?

“If you have to know. One of the captains was extremely skilled with his hands.”

“ _Skilled hands_ ” parrots Raven, and Harper explodes into giggles. “And what was the name of this guy with the skilled hands?”

“We are hoping he was skilled with something other than his hands.”

Echo feels herself blush. “A skilled partner is very welcome to get over pre-battle jitters.”

“And celebrate post-battle victories, I am sure,” Emori must be part fox, for her eyes to twinkle with such mischief.

“Is he waiting for you in the bunker?” That’s Harper’s kind voice.

“No. He is dead. He was guarding the bunker when Skaikru and Trikru attacked.”

Harper’s face falls like she is honestly sad about it and Echo bites the inside of her cheek, hating that it’s her who always destroys the mood.

“I am so sorry,” says the healer, squeezing Echo’s hand.

“To dead friends!” decides Emori raising the bottle and taking a long swing.

"And dead family," adds Raven, drinking.

"And dead lovers," whispers Harper.

"And dead clans," Echo chases the bitter words down with the hot drink and forces herself not to think of the thing curled under her stomach.

“We are one clan now;” Emori staggers to her feet, long hair framing her beautiful face. “All of us against the universe.”

“What an odd clan we make.”

 

***

 

Echo knows she shouldn’t get attached. She knows she shouldn’t talk to it or imagine a little one curled up n her arms.

She won’t be able to keep it anyway, Skairku will not waste resources in the babe from another clan, not when they are all spread so thin already.

Her thumb rubs on the taut skin.

Only two or three more months to go and the problem will be dealt with.

It will probably be born sickly and small, apparently dead already, what with how little she is eating and how small her belly is. She will be doing it a service.

Echo knows she shouldn’t talk to it. She shouldn’t get attached, it will make it all that much worse.

"I will send you to your sire," she whispers to the unborn thing inside her. "He will take good care of you. Let you grow strong and immortal fro the War Spirit's army. Like your ma, you will serve a greater power. You will grow to be a servant at the Halls of your ancestors. And there you will eat the fat and innards of the great Barcow. You will drink sweet milk directly from her teat, and it will make you're the greatest warrior the Halls could ever dream of."

She shouldn’t try and imagine it, with slanted eyes and a mop of yellow hair like his sire. With her proud cheekbones and auburn hair.

She shouldn’t get attached.

 

***

 

The world isn’t burning anymore. From the bay window at the observation deck, she can see the planet gleaming like a finely shaped gem.

The world is round and so big.

Bellamy has shown her where her clan's territory was – just a tiny speck in a vast brown field.

On nights where she can’t sleep, Echo comes to the observation deck. Bellamy is usually there. They sit in companionable silence, or they talk about stuff they don’t want to share with the others: the mountain and fear and broken trust. The way he talks about his sister makes it clear he loves her like she loved Haiplana Nia: relentlessly and forever. A desperate need to gain their approval and their love.

“Sometimes I wish I had something like O had,” he whispers one night. “That someone would love me like Lincoln loved her.”

Echo watches him, his soft profile and the curls that are continually falling in his eyes – in desperate need of a trim- the long lashes casting shadows she longs to kiss. "It is painful loving like that."

“How can someone become worthy of something like that?”

“Some people just are made to be loved. There is something about them that breaks you, and you cannot help but fall to your knees at their feet and give them your all."

He chuckles darkly, his warm eyes turning from the planet to look at her. “Well, the rest of us unworthy mortals have each other.”

Echo is aware that Bellamy still doesn’t fully trust her, but these nights feel like a safe place where they both become closer. Their friendship isn’t like with Murphy – tentative, in a hidden room, learning different techniques to light a fire – or like with Monty – changing the water in the algae tanks and swapping silly jokes – it isn’t like with the girls – Emori’s quick smile and Harper’s softness or Raven’s fierceness. This is something quiet and private, fragile and burning.

Echo wants to tell him about the thing growing in her belly. Instead, they swap tales of their childhood: his mother and secret sister; her training and the way she adored the royal family.

“If you could be anywhere down there, where would you be?”

“Eagle Mountain. Crown Prince Hector took me there once. We rode for two days and climbed the steep paths as the sun rose, turning everything gold and pink. Eagle’s peak is where the mountain kissed the sky. Only the bravest warriors dare climb the slippery rocks near its waterfall. When the sun sets it ablaze, the water at the top tastes like the ale of the Ancestor’s halls. At the top grow ice bells. They were Hector's favorites, so I brought them back down for him. He wove them into my hair, and we drank warm wine."

"Were you two… you know- an item?"

“No,” she looks out the window, the words burning in her throat, a secret she aches to share with someone. “He was my brother,” she whispers, her voice barely audible over the harsh beating of her heart. “We shared the same father. Queen Nia didn’t approve of my mother, so she had her killed. I was never supposed to find out, forever a slave and a servant.”

“I am sorry.”

“I was happy serving the Royal Family. And I loved my queen and my princes like I had never loved anyone before.”

“Does that make you Azgeda's queen, now that they are dead?”

“I am cast out.”

He licks his lips. “You belong with us now.”

She nods. “What about you, Bellamy? Where would you be if you could stand anywhere in the world."

He looks out the great window. “There was a lake east of our dropship. It was close enough that I would hear if something went wrong, far enough that I could pretend I was alone. When no wind blew, I could barely hear the voices from camp. I taught myself to swim there. It was this bowl of perfect water like you see in vids, trees looming around it, and silverfish roaming the depths. If I lay on my back, I could see this stretch of perfect blue sky and imagine I was a bird, floating up there." He scrunches his nose in self-deprecation and rubs the back of his head, clearly embarrassed. "It sounds so ridiculous, said like that."

 

After the first months, the veil of melancholy starts to lift. They all lost people, they all lost a home and friends and freedom. But they are building something up here, and the memories hurt less the more time passes.

Echo offers to cut Bellamy’s hair and teases him about his lack of a beard.

“It grows in patchy. And it itches. Really growing a beard is more trouble than it’s worth.”

“I thought you wanted to keep your childish appearance.”

He braids her hair and comments on her heavy jacket. “You know, you don’t need to wear all your clothes at once all the time.”

“I would feel naked with only a shirt and pants. Don’t you people ever feel cold?”

“Said the ice warrior.”

She smiles crookedly. “Give me a few more weeks, I might get used to your clothes.”

He ties a bow at the end of her braid and smiles down at her. He isn’t convinced with her answer, but he knows to not prod. They both have their secrets.

Hers will be over in the next fortnight.

 

***

 

The child decides to arrive while she's folding laundry. It feels like someone is trying to wrench her guts out, but she manages to bite back a scream. She has an approximate idea of what she needs to do and hurries to the bathroom to fill in a basin with water. Cramps and contractions accompanying her with increasing insistence. Much like its sire, the child seems to have little patience.

Echo locks the door to her room and pulls her ruined pants and underwear off. She finds a sturdy strip of leather and wedges it between her teeth, just as another wave of contractions hit her.

Echo claws at her bed, squatting low on the floor and praying to any Spirit that might glance her way to end this torment. And just as suddenly as it started, it is over, and she's kneeling on the floor, holding a grime-covered babe.

She spits the leather strip to the side and bends over the basin, submerging the child trice as is tradition: Once in honor of the mother, twice in honor of the father, three in honor of the clan.

It is a boy. Ten perfect fingers curled into nut-sized fists. Ten perfect toes adorning the tiny feet at the end of chubby legs. He is so small he can fit comfortably in her cupped hands.

He blinks his gray eyes open.

The baby doesn't look like his sire. He also doesn't look like her. It seems like any other baby.

Her heart beats harshly against her ribs as she takes the kid and pushes it down into the water one final time.

After a few seconds, it starts to trash and fight and she can't. She can't. She can't.

The baby coughs when she presses it into her chest, shaking from head to toe, tears running down her cheeks, falling on the hairless head of her child.

“I am sorry,” she whispers into the quietness of her cell. “I am sorry.”

 

***

 

Echo watches her small one sleep.

The problem should have been dealt with, but two days after its birth there it remains. A slip of a human, so fragile and strong and she wants nothing more than to show him to her friends. For them to look at this beautiful human, she made. But she can't, because he is a secret. Her secret. Because he belongs to another clan and they don't have enough anything to spare.

She caresses the velvety cheek.

Nameless babes that die within their first weeks go to the Halls of their Ancestors as servants. If she names him and he doesn’t die a warrior’s death, he’ll fall into the Void forever.

Echo won’t condemn him to that fate. Somehow she will make sure he gets to the Halls.

She only needs to shake off Skaikru’s weakness.

Someone knocks on her door, the noise startling her.

“Echo, you in there?”

It is Bellamy. Of course, it is Bellamy. He tries the door just as she pushes the small box her child is in under her bed. "Echo, please, open, I am worried."

She goes over and opens the door. “What can I do for you, Bellamy?” She forces her eyes to remain on his face, her body to relax.

“Are you feeling ok? You look pale.”

“I am well.”

“You lost the jacket.”

Now that the little one is born, she doesn’t need all her layers to hide the bulge of her belly. “I took your words to heart.”

His smile is warm and childish, and she wishes she wasn't so nervous and could enjoy it. "You have missed game our game nights for the past few days, I was wondering if you were feeling fine."

He seems concerned. “I think I might have caught a cold.” She lies. “As we all live in close quarters, I thought it would be better if I refrained of your company.”

“You should go to Harper, we have stuff to make that go away.”

“I will refrain of using Skaikru medicine if it is fine with you.”

He stares at her, and it dawns on Echo that he knows she is lying. Has probably known for months. Bellamy closes the door and fear tears through her like the jaws of a rabid dog.

“Where is it, Echo?”

“I don’t know what you mean, mas-Bellamy.”

“I spent fifteen years hiding a person from existence, Echo. I’ll ask one more time: where is it.”

“It will not be a problem, Bellamy, I swear.”

He doesn’t move, doesn’t take his eyes off her and damn this man and the power he holds over her. Slowly, Echo goes to her bed and pulls the box from under her bed. The babe blinks up at her, his tiny fist inside its toothless mouth.

Bellamy's expression twists like he's in agonizing pain. Slowly he picks the child up, and it fits so well in his arms. "Why didn't you tell me?"

“It won’t be a problem much longer. I will get rid of it, I swear.”

He tenses, taking a few steps back and pressing the babe against his chest like he wants to shield it from her. His face twists into a grimace of pain and anger. "I won't bother your clan with my spawn, I swear."

“That’s why you’ve kept it a secret? You think we will kick you two out?!”

The child groans, startled by the loud voice, and Bellamy rocks it instinctively.

“Won’t you? What good is a baby to you?”

In that instant Echo realizes she had never before seen Bellamy truly angry. He might have been mad, exasperated, tired, sad or betrayed, but never as angry as he is in this instant. The fact that he is holding her kid while so angry makes her uneasy. It is so small and weak.

“It is what any good leader would do, Bellamy. Look after their people.”

“YOU ARE MY PEOPLE!” Bellamy roars.

“But his sire wasn’t. Some things are the same for every clan."

He presses his lips together. “If that is what you want” he offers her the baby. “Kill it.”

He doesn’t think she is capable of doing it. He’s testing her weakness to decide if she is as strong as he thought she was. Echo lays the babe in his box and picks her knife from under her bed.

She rests the tip of her knife on his tiny chest.

Echo can feel Bellamy’s eyes on her back, staring assessing how useful his broken warrior really is.

The babe doesn’t look like anyone. It could be any child.

But it isn’t. It is hers she carried it around for nine months. She told it stories of the Great Halls and of his sire, of battles and snow-covered fields.

She tried not to get attached, but-

The sight of black blood welling up from the tiny cut on the baby's skin has bile rising into her throat.

Bellamy’s hand wraps around the knife. To help her or to take the knife away she isn’t sure. She can only see the crying baby and the black blood.

He pulls the knife from her hand and pulls her into his arms. He is warm and robust, and one of his hands buries itself into her hair. "Shh. It’s ok.”

“I am so sorry” she sobs. She is useless and a disappointment to her clan. She’s weak. If her masters saw her now, they would be so disappointed.

“Dude what the hell are you doing in there-?“ Echo buries her head into Bellamy’s shoulder at the sound of the door opening and Murphy coming to an abrupt halt.

“Can you take the kid?” Asks Bellamy, his hands locking around Echo, effectively keeping her in position.

"Is that a baby?" that is Monty, alarmed by the sound. Out of the corner of her eye, Echo sees Murphy pick up her babe and clumsily rock him. "Aren't you a cute little thing?"

And just like that, her secret is out.

 

***

 

The naming of the babe somehow becomes a public affair in which every one of the six members of her clan wants to have a say in the matter. Bellamy has the weirdest suggestions, Harper suggests she call him Patrick in honor of his sire. Monty and Raven offer Skaikru’s greatest thinkers. Emori throws around the names of famous Wasteland legends. And Murphy calls him Mouse before anyone can stop him. The baby laughs loudly acknowledging and accepting the name.

“Guess you are Mouse now,” Echo sighs, rubbing the baby’s velvety cheek.

“I don’t think that’s how name selection goes,” says Raven.

“All hail Mouse kom Spacekru,” says Bellamy

"And let us remember to never let Murphy name any more children," smiles Monty.

“What you rather he was called Augustus like Bellamy wanted?”

“Augustus was a great man.”

As the bickering between leader and Fox start, Echo sits back and watches her clan. It is a cobbled together clan of misfits, one in which mutants and outcasts and Fox share a table with farmers and warriors and leaders. One in which everyone is welcome. She kisses her little one’s head.

Her heart beats hard, sending happiness rolling through her veins, warming her whole body.

Bellamy catches her eye and smiles, warm and genuine.

**Author's Note:**

> this wasn't beta'd  
> Thank you for reading and commenting :D


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